11 ms·

This basic income crowdfunding campaign reached its goal in less than 48 hours

43 points by luckyisgood 13y ago

luckyisgood 13y ago
The goal has been set at 15,000 EUR and the duration of the campaign at only 14 days. There are still 12 days left in this campaign and the donations keep coming in.
KiwiCoder 13y ago
I'd not heard of the basic income concept until now so my reaction might be naive, but what benefit could possibly justify the collection and redistribution of a fixed amount of cash to everyone, regardless of their situation? For example, if 1 person in 10 is thirsty, what benefit derives from giving water to all 10 versus the 1 - isn't that simply a wasteful distribution of resources? Even in the extreme case where a blind distribution of resource would save a life I cannot see it being superior to a distribution based on actual need.
- SEMW 13y ago
  Distribution based on need (means-testing) seems to scale poorly. You need a system to determine means, which at governmental scales is inevitably bureaucratic, resource-intensive, and prone to cheating. Point is, it is always possible to take a means-tested system and turn it into a universal system without changing the final distribution. Take your thirst example. Say nine people have 100 units of water and the tenth has 0. A means-tested welfare system might involve taking 5 units from each of the 9 people and giving it to the tenth, leaving the nine with 95 and the tenth with 45. Now, instead, we increase the 'tax' from 5% to 50%, and give everyone 45 units. The resultant distribution is the same (the nine have 95, the tenth has 45), but this way involves no means-testing. OK, so the numbers here are a bit unrealistic, but the point is, given any means-tested system you can always make it universal and just make the tax system more progressive to cancel out the benefits paid to the non-needy.
- jrkatz 13y ago
  To construct a trivial example, say we give every citizen $2000 a month in post-tax basic income. Of course, most citizens have jobs and other sources of income. To make math easier, assume this government has a flat income tax of 20% If you earn $0, you are pay $0 in tax and get $2000 in basic income. If you earn $9000, you pay $1800 in taxes and get $2000 in basic income, netting you $200. Basic income washes at $10,000, and after that serves only to defray your tax costs until it is hardly noticeable. I can't speak to what levels of taxation and basic income might be useful -- these ones have been selected for convenient math -- but that's the general idea of it. Or, in terms of your water metaphor, if one person in ten is thirsty, we give water to all ten, but we also take from the nine, so they actually see a small loss. The water didn't come from nowhere.
  - KiwiCoder 13y ago
    This is the answer that made most sense to me - I'll attempt to paraphrase; The net benefit of basic income for an individual tends to zero (percent) as the individual's income rises.
  - transfire 13y ago
    FYI, for the States at least, $2000/mo is too high. It always strikes me... I don't think people who make good money often understand just how poor most people really are. The lower 50% of U.S. tax payers only average around $15,000/yr. If I were to guess, approx. 50% of the poverty level would make a good peg. I also think parent should get additional allowances for no more than two children. That said, the system has a tendency to balance itself (the marvels of free-market capitalism when allowed to work properly) so no mater how much was granted per month, the system could self-adjust. Unfortunately there are so many entrenched interest gumming up the works these days, I'm not sure anything about the markets are really working "freely" as they should.
    - JackFr 13y ago
      Parents should get no allowance for any children, and children should get the same benefit as everyone else.
- Kliment 13y ago
  Basically, it's super-expensive to check actual need, and by removing the administrative expense related to it you end up getting a much more efficient system. There's also the side effects of making part-time employment easier and speculative/entrepreneurial projects safer. To match your analogy, if it costs 11 units of water to determine who is thirsty, then giving water to all ten costs 10 units, and giving water to just the one costs 12.
- JanezStupar 13y ago
  In quite a lot of Europe we have social support schemes that are supposed the same net effect. Except if you are unemployed for more than X. Or if you have more than a minimal wage on your bank account. Or.. Or.. Or.. All these exceptions are meant to cut social support from people who are not entitled to it. While in reality they usually hurt people who have no means to be really productive. Quite a lot of resources are spent on edge cases, which decreases efficiency and transparency. Thus making these schemes ineffective for what they were designed to do. I think that basic income is an awesome idea and should be at least tried so we can see if it works out in practice. Especially because we can afford it.
  - JackFr 13y ago
    > Especially because we can afford it. You mean you can afford it. How do you know if I can afford it? By necessity, to implement this, you've got to take money from people and give it to other people. Your assumption is that by rights any one in the category of those losing money, is making so much that they lack any moral claim to it.
    - JanezStupar 13y ago
      We already do that. Throughout Europe we take 40-50% of personal income + taxing corporations to fund common good programs. I will argue that we needn't take any more than we take currently. Expecting that taxes would drop because of BI is ludicrous. However less of our money may be wasted and more of the needy may be served. You don't need to trust my word. Run some numbers[1]. [1]: https://googledrive.com/host/0B68HCFLtgK_QTHRGWGZBTkRNQjQ/UBI_calculator.html https://googledrive.com/host/0B68HCFLtgK_QTHRGWGZBTkRNQjQ/UB...
      - JackFr 13y ago
        Fair point. Still not sure it's such a great idea though...
        JanezStupar 13y ago
- maxerickson 13y ago
  I think the hope is that it is sort of like digging a well.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
SanderMak 13y ago
Maybe I'm missing something, but if they want to gather signatures - why not add a link to the petition so people can actually sign?
- luckyisgood 13y ago
  Because you need to be focused on one goal only. This campaign's goal is to reach 15,000 EUR. The target audience for this particular campaign are people who already signed the initiative and who are mostly informed about the Initiative.
  - SanderMak 13y ago
    Hence you post it to HN, who have all obviously signed the initiative? Sorry, but that seems like a missed opportunity.
- Spone 13y ago
  Here is the link: http://sign.basicincome2013.eu http://sign.basicincome2013.eu
sz4kerto 13y ago
"Unconditional basic income is a new form of total social security for all citizens. It’s an unconditional monthly sum, paid out to by the government to every citizen - rich or poor, old or young, employed or unemployed." Well, they should have written "Unconditional basic income is a new form of total social security for all citizens. It’s an unconditional monthly sum, taken from taxpayers and paid out to every citizen - rich or poor, old or young, employed or unemployed. "
- jaibot 13y ago
  Combined with some progressive taxation this works out to be massively more efficient and helpful than most other forms of welfare. Replace foodstamps/subsidized housing/unemployment-insurance/myriad-of-other-safety-net-programs with a basic guaranteed income and everyone is better off. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guaranteed_minimum_income http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guaranteed_minimum_income .
  - KiwiCoder 13y ago
    Guaranteed minimum income is based on need, basic income is based on citizenship.
  - sz4kerto 13y ago
    I might agree. However, most people will want basic income as an extra, not as a replacement. I would bet a significant amount on that (i.e. basic income being popular only until poor people figure out what are they going to lose). The masses don't like taking care of themselves. Not even if they get 'free' money for that.
    - AnthonyMouse 13y ago
      Any proposed government program that causes the net wealth of any distinct group of people to increase or decrease is going to be supported or opposed by various people for self-interested reasons. But the point is not to to wage war over who steals money from someone else and gives it to themselves by way of government bureaucracy, the point is to do something that results in a net benefit to society, for example by reducing the disincentive to work created by the discontinuation of government benefits when one finds gainful employment. The net result of that is to reduce unemployment and underemployment, which increases the tax base and allows a given level of government services to be provided at a lower tax rate (or an increased level of government services to be provided at the same tax rate, depending on your policy preferences).
ck2 13y ago
Nice to see but what is with the mountain climber image which reminds me of someone who would have plenty of free time and cash for such a hobby. Is the idea to be "upwardly mobile" ? I mean I have to grasp for that idea.
- grimtrigger 13y ago
  No one likes looking at poor people.
kfk 13y ago
I will never support this idea. This is kind of thinking is extremely nationalistic: I am entitled to free money because I was born in XYZ. On top of this, this idea has very weak economics fundamentals, there is no prove that growth comes from redistributing wealth. There is plenty of prove growth comes from innovation and innovation comes from people actually working. We are in denial. The whole Europe is in denial. We don't realize the only way out of this mess is working more and cutting public spending. Instead we propose the exact opposite.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
  - kfk 13y ago
    And let's not forget how racist we (Europe) become when it comes to immigration from these poor countries. I have a proposal, let's open the gates of Europe to everybody that doesn't have a criminal record.
    - JanezStupar 13y ago
      I admire your idealism. However you forget that poor countries have high levels of corruption which makes any kinds of records they keep dubious at best. Poor countries will have to commit on working out their issues on their own. We must help them, but there is no way we can do it for them. On a positive note, global trends show that poverty is constantly decreasing and that equality is rising. Slowly but steadily.
      - kfk 13y ago
        How can you let them grow if in Europe we strongly protect things like agriculture or we make things artificially expensive with copyrights and the like. I mean, what can these people do?
        JanezStupar 13y ago
kabdib 13y ago
People voting themselves bread. I'm sure this will turn out well.
- grimtrigger 13y ago
  I have no idea how this is going to turn out if it gets passed, but I hope it does. I'd much rather Europe be the guinea pig.
- agilebyte 13y ago
  Are people not allowed to do that? In democratic regimes?
- JanezStupar 13y ago
  Technology and automatization of production is changing everything, the more we raise productivity the less people can satisfy our needs for products. Do you propose we just start shooting people who are below the skill level required for sustaining the economy? I for one would like to avoid living in a Logan's run type of universe. Thank you very much...
w_t_payne 13y ago
With little administrative overhead, this should be a more effective way of stimulating demand than QE.
- JackFr 13y ago
  Even if I assume your premise, why would you assume that this is a more effective way of stimulating demand? (I'm not necessarily disagreeing its just not obvious to me that one mechanism is better than the other.)
  - w_t_payne 13y ago
    As I understand it, the QE strategy is for the central bank to buy bonds. Bonds become overbought, so investors shift to stocks and shares, lifting the stock market. Investors benefit, as do companies seeking to raise funds through share issues, but uninvested consumers do not. As a result, the stock market goes up, and borrowing costs for companies go down, but the "Real" economy stagnates. Companies can borrow easily to fund expansion, but have no real market to sell into, because the stock market is disconnected from the underlying "main street" economy. Basic income provides another mechanism for Keynesian reflation, but targets the "real" economy rather than the stock market, so stimulates actual demand, rather than pumping up the bubble. Of course, inflation is a massive risk with both of these strategies ... and may happen more directly and more quickly with the basic income strategy rather than with QE ... so on second thoughts ... it might not be too great an idea.
RivieraKid 13y ago
One important advantage of BI would be that it would allow the labor market to be more liberal (especially in Europe, I don't know about the situation in the US). Employees wouldn't need to be protected that much, because they would be less scared of being fired.
achy 13y ago
The problem I envision with a basic income model is that it could have an inflationary effect - shifting the baseline. The only way this doesn't happen is if our basic income economies exploit non basic income economies - and even this wouldn't prevent housing, energy, and (non artificially) scarce items from inflation.
- AnthonyMouse 13y ago
  Why do you expect inflation? Inflation only occurs if the source of the money comes from creating currency. If it comes from taxation then you're not increasing aggregate demand at all, you're just eliminating the large disincentive to seeking employment created by the discontinuation of government benefits if you succeed.
  - achy 13y ago
    sorry, price inflation. Supply and demand.
    - AnthonyMouse 13y ago
      There is no difference between "inflation" and "price inflation." Suppose that yesterday you received $50 from government assistance programs (e.g. food assistance) but today you receive $50 as a basic income and no food assistance. You have the same amount of money to spend. Suppose that yesterday you received no government assistance and paid no net taxes but today you receive $50 as a basic income and pay $50 in new taxes. You have the same amount of money to spend. There will be some people who, on net, receive more or less from a basic income (less the taxes required to pay for it) than they do now -- mostly the very rich would pay more and the working class would receive more -- but the net amount of money in the average person's pocket remains the same. The difference is that you don't have the disincentive to seeking employment that the current unemployed do when they lose government assistance by taking a job.
stanjourdan 13y ago
If you are EU citizen, don't forget to sign the petition: http://sign.basicincome2013.eu http://sign.basicincome2013.eu

43 points by luckyisgood 13y ago

The goal has been set at 15,000 EUR and the duration of the campaign at only 14 days. There are still 12 days left in this campaign and the donations keep coming in.

KiwiCoder 13y ago

I'd not heard of the basic income concept until now so my reaction might be naive, but what benefit could possibly justify the collection and redistribution of a fixed amount of cash to everyone, regardless of their situation? For example, if 1 person in 10 is thirsty, what benefit derives from giving water to all 10 versus the 1 - isn't that simply a wasteful distribution of resources? Even in the extreme case where a blind distribution of resource would save a life I cannot see it being superior to a distribution based on actual need.

SEMW 13y ago
Distribution based on need (means-testing) seems to scale poorly. You need a system to determine means, which at governmental scales is inevitably bureaucratic, resource-intensive, and prone to cheating. Point is, it is always possible to take a means-tested system and turn it into a universal system without changing the final distribution. Take your thirst example. Say nine people have 100 units of water and the tenth has 0. A means-tested welfare system might involve taking 5 units from each of the 9 people and giving it to the tenth, leaving the nine with 95 and the tenth with 45. Now, instead, we increase the 'tax' from 5% to 50%, and give everyone 45 units. The resultant distribution is the same (the nine have 95, the tenth has 45), but this way involves no means-testing. OK, so the numbers here are a bit unrealistic, but the point is, given any means-tested system you can always make it universal and just make the tax system more progressive to cancel out the benefits paid to the non-needy.
jrkatz 13y ago
To construct a trivial example, say we give every citizen $2000 a month in post-tax basic income. Of course, most citizens have jobs and other sources of income. To make math easier, assume this government has a flat income tax of 20% If you earn $0, you are pay $0 in tax and get $2000 in basic income. If you earn $9000, you pay $1800 in taxes and get $2000 in basic income, netting you $200. Basic income washes at $10,000, and after that serves only to defray your tax costs until it is hardly noticeable. I can't speak to what levels of taxation and basic income might be useful -- these ones have been selected for convenient math -- but that's the general idea of it. Or, in terms of your water metaphor, if one person in ten is thirsty, we give water to all ten, but we also take from the nine, so they actually see a small loss. The water didn't come from nowhere.
- KiwiCoder 13y ago
  This is the answer that made most sense to me - I'll attempt to paraphrase; The net benefit of basic income for an individual tends to zero (percent) as the individual's income rises.
- transfire 13y ago
  FYI, for the States at least, $2000/mo is too high. It always strikes me... I don't think people who make good money often understand just how poor most people really are. The lower 50% of U.S. tax payers only average around $15,000/yr. If I were to guess, approx. 50% of the poverty level would make a good peg. I also think parent should get additional allowances for no more than two children. That said, the system has a tendency to balance itself (the marvels of free-market capitalism when allowed to work properly) so no mater how much was granted per month, the system could self-adjust. Unfortunately there are so many entrenched interest gumming up the works these days, I'm not sure anything about the markets are really working "freely" as they should.
  - JackFr 13y ago
    Parents should get no allowance for any children, and children should get the same benefit as everyone else.
Kliment 13y ago
Basically, it's super-expensive to check actual need, and by removing the administrative expense related to it you end up getting a much more efficient system. There's also the side effects of making part-time employment easier and speculative/entrepreneurial projects safer. To match your analogy, if it costs 11 units of water to determine who is thirsty, then giving water to all ten costs 10 units, and giving water to just the one costs 12.
JanezStupar 13y ago
In quite a lot of Europe we have social support schemes that are supposed the same net effect. Except if you are unemployed for more than X. Or if you have more than a minimal wage on your bank account. Or.. Or.. Or.. All these exceptions are meant to cut social support from people who are not entitled to it. While in reality they usually hurt people who have no means to be really productive. Quite a lot of resources are spent on edge cases, which decreases efficiency and transparency. Thus making these schemes ineffective for what they were designed to do. I think that basic income is an awesome idea and should be at least tried so we can see if it works out in practice. Especially because we can afford it.
- JackFr 13y ago
  > Especially because we can afford it. You mean you can afford it. How do you know if I can afford it? By necessity, to implement this, you've got to take money from people and give it to other people. Your assumption is that by rights any one in the category of those losing money, is making so much that they lack any moral claim to it.
  - JanezStupar 13y ago
    We already do that. Throughout Europe we take 40-50% of personal income + taxing corporations to fund common good programs. I will argue that we needn't take any more than we take currently. Expecting that taxes would drop because of BI is ludicrous. However less of our money may be wasted and more of the needy may be served. You don't need to trust my word. Run some numbers[1]. [1]: https://googledrive.com/host/0B68HCFLtgK_QTHRGWGZBTkRNQjQ/UBI_calculator.html https://googledrive.com/host/0B68HCFLtgK_QTHRGWGZBTkRNQjQ/UB...
    - JackFr 13y ago
      Fair point. Still not sure it's such a great idea though...
      - JanezStupar 13y ago
maxerickson 13y ago
I think the hope is that it is sort of like digging a well.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

SanderMak 13y ago

Maybe I'm missing something, but if they want to gather signatures - why not add a link to the petition so people can actually sign?

luckyisgood 13y ago
Because you need to be focused on one goal only. This campaign's goal is to reach 15,000 EUR. The target audience for this particular campaign are people who already signed the initiative and who are mostly informed about the Initiative.
- SanderMak 13y ago
  Hence you post it to HN, who have all obviously signed the initiative? Sorry, but that seems like a missed opportunity.
Spone 13y ago
Here is the link: http://sign.basicincome2013.eu http://sign.basicincome2013.eu

sz4kerto 13y ago

"Unconditional basic income is a new form of total social security for all citizens. It’s an unconditional monthly sum, paid out to by the government to every citizen - rich or poor, old or young, employed or unemployed." Well, they should have written "Unconditional basic income is a new form of total social security for all citizens. It’s an unconditional monthly sum, taken from taxpayers and paid out to every citizen - rich or poor, old or young, employed or unemployed. "

jaibot 13y ago
Combined with some progressive taxation this works out to be massively more efficient and helpful than most other forms of welfare. Replace foodstamps/subsidized housing/unemployment-insurance/myriad-of-other-safety-net-programs with a basic guaranteed income and everyone is better off. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guaranteed_minimum_income http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guaranteed_minimum_income .
- KiwiCoder 13y ago
  Guaranteed minimum income is based on need, basic income is based on citizenship.
- sz4kerto 13y ago
  I might agree. However, most people will want basic income as an extra, not as a replacement. I would bet a significant amount on that (i.e. basic income being popular only until poor people figure out what are they going to lose). The masses don't like taking care of themselves. Not even if they get 'free' money for that.
  - AnthonyMouse 13y ago
    Any proposed government program that causes the net wealth of any distinct group of people to increase or decrease is going to be supported or opposed by various people for self-interested reasons. But the point is not to to wage war over who steals money from someone else and gives it to themselves by way of government bureaucracy, the point is to do something that results in a net benefit to society, for example by reducing the disincentive to work created by the discontinuation of government benefits when one finds gainful employment. The net result of that is to reduce unemployment and underemployment, which increases the tax base and allows a given level of government services to be provided at a lower tax rate (or an increased level of government services to be provided at the same tax rate, depending on your policy preferences).

ck2 13y ago

Nice to see but what is with the mountain climber image which reminds me of someone who would have plenty of free time and cash for such a hobby. Is the idea to be "upwardly mobile" ? I mean I have to grasp for that idea.

grimtrigger 13y ago
No one likes looking at poor people.

kfk 13y ago

I will never support this idea. This is kind of thinking is extremely nationalistic: I am entitled to free money because I was born in XYZ. On top of this, this idea has very weak economics fundamentals, there is no prove that growth comes from redistributing wealth. There is plenty of prove growth comes from innovation and innovation comes from people actually working. We are in denial. The whole Europe is in denial. We don't realize the only way out of this mess is working more and cutting public spending. Instead we propose the exact opposite.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
- kfk 13y ago
  And let's not forget how racist we (Europe) become when it comes to immigration from these poor countries. I have a proposal, let's open the gates of Europe to everybody that doesn't have a criminal record.
  - JanezStupar 13y ago
    I admire your idealism. However you forget that poor countries have high levels of corruption which makes any kinds of records they keep dubious at best. Poor countries will have to commit on working out their issues on their own. We must help them, but there is no way we can do it for them. On a positive note, global trends show that poverty is constantly decreasing and that equality is rising. Slowly but steadily.
    - kfk 13y ago
      How can you let them grow if in Europe we strongly protect things like agriculture or we make things artificially expensive with copyrights and the like. I mean, what can these people do?
      - JanezStupar 13y ago

kabdib 13y ago

People voting themselves bread. I'm sure this will turn out well.

grimtrigger 13y ago
I have no idea how this is going to turn out if it gets passed, but I hope it does. I'd much rather Europe be the guinea pig.
agilebyte 13y ago
Are people not allowed to do that? In democratic regimes?
JanezStupar 13y ago
Technology and automatization of production is changing everything, the more we raise productivity the less people can satisfy our needs for products. Do you propose we just start shooting people who are below the skill level required for sustaining the economy? I for one would like to avoid living in a Logan's run type of universe. Thank you very much...

w_t_payne 13y ago

With little administrative overhead, this should be a more effective way of stimulating demand than QE.

JackFr 13y ago
Even if I assume your premise, why would you assume that this is a more effective way of stimulating demand? (I'm not necessarily disagreeing its just not obvious to me that one mechanism is better than the other.)
- w_t_payne 13y ago
  As I understand it, the QE strategy is for the central bank to buy bonds. Bonds become overbought, so investors shift to stocks and shares, lifting the stock market. Investors benefit, as do companies seeking to raise funds through share issues, but uninvested consumers do not. As a result, the stock market goes up, and borrowing costs for companies go down, but the "Real" economy stagnates. Companies can borrow easily to fund expansion, but have no real market to sell into, because the stock market is disconnected from the underlying "main street" economy. Basic income provides another mechanism for Keynesian reflation, but targets the "real" economy rather than the stock market, so stimulates actual demand, rather than pumping up the bubble. Of course, inflation is a massive risk with both of these strategies ... and may happen more directly and more quickly with the basic income strategy rather than with QE ... so on second thoughts ... it might not be too great an idea.

RivieraKid 13y ago

One important advantage of BI would be that it would allow the labor market to be more liberal (especially in Europe, I don't know about the situation in the US). Employees wouldn't need to be protected that much, because they would be less scared of being fired.

achy 13y ago

The problem I envision with a basic income model is that it could have an inflationary effect - shifting the baseline. The only way this doesn't happen is if our basic income economies exploit non basic income economies - and even this wouldn't prevent housing, energy, and (non artificially) scarce items from inflation.

AnthonyMouse 13y ago
Why do you expect inflation? Inflation only occurs if the source of the money comes from creating currency. If it comes from taxation then you're not increasing aggregate demand at all, you're just eliminating the large disincentive to seeking employment created by the discontinuation of government benefits if you succeed.
- achy 13y ago
  sorry, price inflation. Supply and demand.
  - AnthonyMouse 13y ago
    There is no difference between "inflation" and "price inflation." Suppose that yesterday you received $50 from government assistance programs (e.g. food assistance) but today you receive $50 as a basic income and no food assistance. You have the same amount of money to spend. Suppose that yesterday you received no government assistance and paid no net taxes but today you receive $50 as a basic income and pay $50 in new taxes. You have the same amount of money to spend. There will be some people who, on net, receive more or less from a basic income (less the taxes required to pay for it) than they do now -- mostly the very rich would pay more and the working class would receive more -- but the net amount of money in the average person's pocket remains the same. The difference is that you don't have the disincentive to seeking employment that the current unemployed do when they lose government assistance by taking a job.

stanjourdan 13y ago

If you are EU citizen, don't forget to sign the petition: http://sign.basicincome2013.eu http://sign.basicincome2013.eu